


now is better than never

by syllogismos



Category: Halt and Catch Fire
Genre: First Time, Fix-It, Loss of Virginity, M/M, Suicide Attempt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-22
Updated: 2020-06-22
Packaged: 2021-03-04 09:35:49
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,657
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24847663
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/syllogismos/pseuds/syllogismos
Summary: Not that Joe doesn’t always seem larger-than-life. He does, always. He’s a blackhole for attention every time he walks in a room. And Ryan knows that he’s particularly susceptible, but he sees it in other people too, men and women. Joe is a magnet, a target for bending curves of attraction, invisible but as effective as an ocean undertow. And at least as dangerous.
Relationships: Joe MacMillan/Ryan Ray
Comments: 10
Kudos: 20





	now is better than never

It takes a minute for what Joe said—“I don’t think I have another next in me. You should know that.”—to settle in, but then Ryan’s on his feet. When he gets to the patio doors, Joe is about to disappear, so Ryan shouts to his back, “What does that even mean?”

Joe turns. “You think you’re owed an explanation?”

Ryan makes a go-on gesture.

Joe stalks back, and it’s one of those moments where his height makes him seem larger-than-life. Not that Joe doesn’t always seem larger-than-life. He does, always. He’s a blackhole for attention every time he walks in a room. And Ryan knows that he’s particularly susceptible, but he sees it in other people too, men and women. Joe is a magnet, a target for bending curves of attraction, invisible but as effective as an ocean undertow. And at least as dangerous.

Joe looms, one hand on the wall next to where the sliding glass doors open, and Ryan is still in the threshold, feeling small and trying not to flinch.

“I could have HIV,” Joe says in a low tone, looking Ryan straight in the eye. “I could be dying of the gay plague,” he pauses. “Is that what you think you  _ deserve _ to know?”

* * *

“You–… But Cameron–“

“It’s called  _ bisexuality _ , Ryan,” Joe spits.

“So you–“

“I slept with this guy, and he comes to tell me last night that he’s HIV positive, and I don’t know yet, I’ve got to go to get tested, but the balance of probability…” Joe trails off and finally looks away, casts his eyes down to the floor.

“I’m sorry.”

Joe lifts his eyes again. “For what?”

Ryan shrugs. Honestly, he said it because it seemed like the right thing to say, so now he’s scrambling for the next right thing. “You could have told me earlier,” he finally offers. “If it helps to talk about it.”

“Nothing helps,” Joe says, back already turned, “Except maybe a drink.”

Joe grabs another two beers from the kitchen, and takes them back outside. At first, Ryan joins him at the railing, dangling his bottle carefully between two fingers from the neck, but Joe’s gaze is fixed to the middle distance, and every time Ryan glances over at him, the way the moonlight catches the crow’s feet around his eyes is like an etching of pure worry and sadness and utter exhaustion, and Ryan just can’t look at it for too long.

He retreats to the chaise and closes his eyes. The guy in the hoodie from last night, who was still there this morning, the one who might have handed Joe his death sentence. Joe was hugging him, embracing him, ruffling the hair at his nape so tenderly that it makes Ryan’s scalp tingle just to think about it. (And it makes his skin heat with shame at having stolen witness to such a private moment.) But more than anything it makes him want to have been in that man’s place, not for the same reason, but just to have felt that touch.

And later, in the small hours of the morning, it hurts, actually physically causes pain in a place low in Ryan’s belly, to walk away from Joe, crying alone in his bedroom.

* * *

After dinner, Joe leads the way back to his condo with no indication that Ryan shouldn’t come with him, even though it’s late. He doesn’t flip on the lights when they arrive, but rather heads straight for the patio, elbows on the railing with the city spread out below him.

Ryan chooses the chaise, as usual, and in this circumstance mostly because he’s a bit too drunk to trust himself to stand without swaying. They’d split nearly two bottles of wine over dinner, and Joe is fine because Joe is a very tall man who parties a lot, but Ryan is neither of those things.

“I do like you,” Joe says without turning around.

“What?”

Joe turns around, leans back with his elbows on the railing and his hands hanging loose. “You said you don’t know if I like you, and I’m saying I do.”

“I like you too.”

“I know,” Joe bends his mouth into a half-smile, sly, “but how do you like me?”

Ryan doesn’t answer, so Joe prompts, “As a boss?”

Ryan laughs. “You’re pretty shit as a boss, you know that.”

“As a friend, then?”

“Are we? Friends?”

“I think we are now,” Joe muses, “But you’ve always liked me.”

“Yes.” Ryan feels his face heat but is comforted that it won’t be visible given the dark and the color of his skin.

“Hmm.” Joe pushes off the railing. “Do you want to sleep out here again, or should I grab sheets for the couch?”

* * *

Joe hands him a tumbler with one and half fingers of amber liquid sloshing gently in the bottom. “Sip it slowly,” he says, “It’s older than you are.”

Ryan has little choice but to follow Joe out onto the patio.

“I’m not HIV positive.”

Ryan narrowly avoids choking on a sip of scotch and panics to find the right reply. “Good, that’s good. That must be a relief, and I’m glad. Glad for you.”

Joe turns away from the landscape. “Sorry.”

“For what?”

“I didn’t mean to make things awkward.”

“You didn’t. I’m pretty sure that’s all on me.” Ryan takes a bigger-than-recommended swallow of the scotch, because  _ Jesus, Joe _ , and it might not be over yet.

It isn’t.

“Maybe,” Joe muses, “But why is that?”

“Oh, I don’t know.” Ryan isn’t drunk yet, not nearly, but it’s been a big day, and maybe it’s the scotch or maybe it’s the stupid tailored suit or maybe it's how Joe looks at him in the stupid tailored suit, but in any case he’s just lost his patience. “Maybe because I have a crush on you that’s visible from space, and you keep dancing around it just to watch me squirm? Maybe that’s why?”

“I’m sorry,” Joe backs up and sits sideways on the chaise, hands hanging between his knees. “In my defense I didn’t think you were that…self-aware.”

“Seriously?!  _ Jesus _ , Joe.” Ryan rakes his free hand through his hair, and it’s surely standing up in odd tufts now. “You can be so fucking patronizing. We’re not all like you, you know, just free to run around picking up whoever we want to take to bed. Some of us spend all of our energy just trying to avoid an arranged fucking marriage to a girl and don’t have anything left–“ Ryan hiccoughs and stops, horrified with himself. He’s gotten carried away. It’s an exaggeration, about the arranged marriage. Sure, his parents set him up on blind dates with other Gujarati girls all the time, but he mostly goes along with it to keep them happy, just like most of the girls do to keep  _ their _ parents happy. Then again, none of them are hiding what Ryan’s hiding. Usually it’s just a non-Desi boyfriend or a lack of desire to settle down and start popping out kids.

The seconds drag, and then Joe is looming, and when Ryan finally looks up, Joe is holding his glass up. “Come on,” he says, “bottoms up.”

Ryan clinks his tumbler with Joe and finishes the scotch in one smooth slick flame down the hatch. Joe takes his glass from him and leads the way back inside. Ryan flops down on the couch and covers his face with his hands. He hasn’t told  _ anyone _ , and to start with Joe of all people is like, expert mode. What the fuck was he  _ thinking _ ?

The couch dips to his left when Joe sits down. He stretches his near arm behind Ryan along the top of the couch, and for a few minutes he just waits patiently.

“Have you told anyone else?” he finally asks, too gently.

“That I’m a faggot?”

“Not the word I’d choose, myself.”

“It’s not the same for you.”

“Perhaps not, but the way I live—openly, as you’d say—is not without its dangers.” Joe sighs; Ryan can  _ feel  _ it: the whole couch moves, just slightly, with the loss of the weight of the air expelled from Joe’s lungs. “I wouldn’t lie to you about that.”

Ryan says nothing. All his mind is bent on the problem of tamping down the sob that’s threatening to break free. Joe’s hand lands softly in the middle of his back, and it does break free as a gross choking thing, but Joe just rubs his hand up and down Ryan’s spine and lets him cry. It’s not even patronizing anymore, it’s just…kind, maybe. Except that Joe is anything but kind. This thought makes Ryan tense up, like some sort of prickly hedgehog or other ugly, unwelcome creature, and Joe’s hand stills momentarily.

Then Ryan is manhandled up and tucked in tight against Joe’s side, his face in Joe’s neck, and Joe is cradling the back of his head in one large hand and letting him cry, and it’s both nearly everything he’s ever wanted and the worst thing in the world.

Correction: the worst thing is when the sobs finally slow down and Ryan is left painfully aware of how his nose is running onto Joe’s fucking collarbone. When he lifts his head, Joe moves the hand on the back of his head down to his shoulder. Ryan sniffs and starts to wipe at where he’s made a mess, but Joe shakes his head. “It’s fine, don’t worry about it.”

The arm that Joe had slung along the back of the sofa is now wrapped around Ryan’s back, heavy and secure.

“How about some delivery Chinese? I’m hungry,” Joe offers while Ryan is wiping his eyes. When Ryan doesn’t answer, Joe’s arm tightens around his back, a brief attention-getting squeeze, almost affectionate. “Yes?”

“Sure,” Ryan answers. His voice comes out more normal than he thought it would. “You know what I like.”

“I  _ do _ know what you like.” Joe extricates himself gently and pads off to the phone.

It turns out that Joe’s second bedroom is his  _ real _ living room, not the interior decorating magazine central space that Ryan’s so used to. There’s a TV and a much more worn—though still not shabby; this is  _ Joe _ , after all—couch and coffee table that definitely has smudges from feet all over it. Joe channel flips while Ryan digs into the bag of Chinese, and they end up watching  _ Close Encounters of the Third Kind _ over potstickers and lo mein, washing it all down with an Anchor Steam each.

The movie lasts longer than the food, and somehow Ryan ends up flush with Joe, thigh to thigh, with Joe’s bicep serving as his neck rest. He lets his eyes droop during a lull in the action, and when he blinks them open again, it’s because the TV is off and Joe is trying to pull his arm out from under Ryan’s head without waking him up.

“Just lay down. I’ll get you a blanket.”

Ryan does as instructed and stretches out on the sofa, curling a little onto his side and shutting his eyes against everything he doesn’t want to think about: coming out to Joe, admitting his crush, crying all over him. When Joe returns with the blanket, Ryan doesn’t open his eyes or acknowledge him, and Joe must think he’s asleep. There’s no other explanation for the fingers sifting through the hair at Ryan’s temple, nor for the featherlight kiss Joe presses there next.

* * *

He would have done it if not for Joe  _ fucking _ MacMillan. Instead, he got pulled back from the ledge (literally) and shouted at. And he’s still getting shouted at, or growled at, more accurately, and Joe has a lot of stamina for this kind of thing, it turns out.

“Are you even listening to me?”

Ryan’s back hits the wall, and he has to reach out to catch his balance, and his hand lands on Joe’s chest, right over his heart, which thumps wildly under his palm.

“You left me no choice!” he grits out and pushes, and Joe stumbles back and somehow their positions end up reversed: Joe against the wall, Ryan with hands on his hips, fuming.

The fight goes out of Joe in a single movement that ends with Joe on his knees, his face pressed to Ryan’s belly, breathing him in like he’s a drug.

Almost jumping to your death is extremely effective for clarifying what’s terrifying from what’s merely scary, it turns out. Kissing Joe? No longer a terrifying prospect. All it takes is grasping Joe’s head and sliding down to press their mouths together, and Joe is immediately on board. Ryan ends up on top, but Joe is controlling the kiss with both hands on Ryan’s head.

When Ryan pulls away, his lips feel swollen and he can’t breathe except in huge heaving gulps. He’s straddling Joe’s hips, and Joe can’t be comfortable on the floor, but he doesn’t protest, only watches Ryan closely. When enough of his brain cells band together again to help him compute, Ryan realizes that what he feels underneath him is Joe’s cock, not uninterested in the preceding events, and he’s in a similar state—and Joe has a front-row view of the tent in his pants.

Ryan scrambles up and heads for the kitchen sink.  _ Water. _ He drinks from his hands and splashes some all over his face for good measure, then nearly jumps a mile when Joe’s hand lands at his lower back.

“Easy, hey– You OK?” Ryan closes his eyes, and Joe starts moving his hand up and down, soothing but still fucking arousing at the same time.

“Talk to me.”

“What do you want me to say?”

Joe drops his hand from Ryan’s back and turns him so they’re face to face, both leaning a hip against the kitchen counter.

“What do you want?”

“I don’t know,” Ryan says, despairing. “I want you–“

“Me?”

“Yes of course you! Crush visible from space, remember?”

Joe grins, but only briefly.

“But I hadn’t even kissed anyone, been kissed, all of it, before ten minutes ago, and I don’t know what I want, all right?”

“Better.” Joe reaches out and traces Ryan’s bottom lip with his thumb. “And you don’t have to decide everything right now. Can I kiss you again?”

Ryan nods because he doesn’t trust his voice and swallows nervously as Joe bends to him.

Joe is gentle and slow, trapping his thumb in the kiss until he moves it slightly. The scorching heat is gone but replaced with tenderness and warmth. Joe’s lips press and release, press and release, all over Ryan’s mouth, all over his jaw and his eyes and along the side of his nose back to his mouth, and only then does Joe press a little harder and try for a taste. The kiss escalates until it’s wet and deep and thorough. Joe boosts Ryan up onto the counter to even out their heights, and Ryan instinctively spreads his knees for Joe to fit between them.

Joe’s hands are both on his head again, directing, so Ryan circles his own around Joe’s wrists to get Joe’s attention and pulls away a little. Joe kisses his cheek while Ryan’s still getting his breath back, and Ryan can’t help but follow that with a light kiss to Joe’s mouth.

“Good?” Joe asks.

“If this is pity, I don’t want to know.” Ryan dares himself to look Joe in the eye as he says it. “Just take me to bed.”

Joe is not quite Joe after that: he’s a gentler, more merciful version of Joe who helps Ryan off the counter and leads him to the bedroom by hand, who peels Ryan out of his clothes and sinks to his knees to suck Ryan off, placing Ryan’s hands on his head and looking up under his heavy brows with a look that even the most insecure part of Ryan’s brain has to admit really, really doesn’t look like pity.

When Joe pulls off to speak, his voice has dropped considerably. “I want you to finish in my mouth, because that should be on anyone’s checklist, really, but don’t think I’ll be done with you then.” Joe reaches for Ryan’s cock and holds it loosely, but it still jumps in his hand, and Ryan has to bite his lip. “Unless you want to be done, of course. All right?”

“You–“ Ryan loses the sentence before it really starts. “Yeah. All right.”

The wet and heat and suction and movement are what Ryan’s dick likes, likes a lot, but it’s the little things that Ryan likes, the things he never thought to imagine. It’s Joe’s right hand clutching tight to his left, their fingers threaded together. It’s the moments when Ryan’s dick is in as far as it will go, and Joe’s eyelids flutter closed, and he breathes out hard through his nose like he’s savoring the moment. And when Ryan comes, it’s the way Joe pulls him in closer with his free hand at Ryan’s lower back and doesn’t move until Ryan pulls his dick out, shuddering with oversensitivity.

Ryan learns what he tastes like from Joe’s mouth, and he learns what it feels like to hold another man’s cock in his hand when Joe’s all but leaps into his. Joe shows him how with theirs fingers interlaced again, and after he spurts all over both of their hands and cleans up with his discarded t-shirt, he circles his thumb and forefinger around the base of Ryan’s cock again. Ryan lets Joe make space for himself between his spread knees and can’t suppress a shudder as Joe continues to stroke him back to hardness. It’s almost too much, but eventually Ryan comes a second time anyway, whimpering into Joe’s mouth and arching up into his hand.

After slightly less cursory clean up with a damp washcloth, Joe manhandles Ryan onto his side and settles himself in as the big spoon, one long arm clamped around Ryan’s middle.  _ Not on my watch _ , it says.

* * *

When Ryan walks by the door—Joe MacMillan, English Literature—it seems almost surreal, and he definitely  _ can’t _ , not yet, so he finds the nearest men’s and washes the clamminess off his hands for lack of anything else to do.

At least he’s lost the baby face. His stubble is salt and pepper now, and so is the hair at his temples, and it’s a good look, he thinks, especially now that he’s had a proper haircut and got a button down that fits.

He still has to pause and smooth down his shirt and clear his throat before he knocks.

Joe’s voice hasn’t changed, but he doesn’t look up from his papers immediately after telling Ryan to come in, and the suspense is awful.

The look on Joe’s face when he does look up? Inscrutable.

Until a smile curves up one side and Joe waves for Ryan to shut the door behind him.

“I’m not an easy man to find,” Joe says, leaning back in his chair, hands behind his head.

“Especially not without a computer, not that I’d know how to use one of those things,” Ryan waves at the blue and white transparent sculpture on Joe’s desk.

“I’ll teach you.”

“I’d enjoy that.”

“And dinner?”

“Now?” Ryan’s still nervous; he can’t even remember what time it is.

Joe looks at the clock—3:15. “Maybe a late lunch? What do you feel like?”

“Chinese?”

Joe’s house is more lived in than the condo in San Francisco, and there are books everywhere. There’s a huge TV in the living room, not hidden away, and even some dishes in the sink, not yet washed.

“Do you like it? I’m afraid there isn’t a view.”

“I really don’t miss your patio, Joe.”

Joe winces, and Ryan feels immediate regret.

“Sorry. I’m nervous, and if I don’t– We’re just going to keep dancing around it, and I don’t think I can stand it. I went to prison. It sucked, but I’m fine. It’s not like I was locked up with all the gangbangers and ax-murderers.” This is not quite true. There are gangbangers who end up in minimum security, gangbangers with life sentences for triple homicide and massive neck or back tattoos who have mellowed after thirty-five years and in their late 50s or early 60s developed hobbies like memorizing the novels of Jack London or cultivating strange pets—slugs, small California native tarantulas—in the small amount of personal space an inmate is allowed.

“I’m very thankful for the accounts you and Gordon set up,” Ryan continues, flustered, “and I’ll be back on my feet in no time, I’m sure. I just– I wanted to say thank you in person and see how you were doing, and it looks like you’re doing well, Joe, really well.”

Joe shrugs and kneads the top of one of his armchairs in his large hands. “Do you have a place to stay?”

“Transitional housing,” Ryan says, “I’ve been out for about a week, actually. I just– I couldn’t–“

There’s a clock somewhere in the room, a mechanical one, because Ryan can hear the  _ tick _ of the second hand in the void left by his failure to continue saying…anything at all.

“You were under no obligation to,” Joe says softly, only bruising the silence, not breaking it. Then, more brightly, “What’s it like?”

“The halfway house?”

Joe nods.

“I don’t know, it’s fine. I’m the youngest there, not that– You know, not that I’m  _ young _ , but these guys have done twenty or thirty or forty.” This isn’t interesting, and besides, Ryan doesn’t really want to talk about it. It’s complicated. There are even parts of it that are actually kind of fun, like when– “There’s a computer.”

“What?”

“Yeah, a shitty PC with a dial-up connection. We’re supposed to use it to look for jobs on something called The Monster Board.”

“But you’re not supposed to–“

“I know, but I was, like, one of the first, right? They don’t really have procedures for the likes of me, yet. They keep fucking up.” Ryan teaches the other guys, the lifers who got paroled and who have never even typed their own names out on a keyboard, much less used the World Wide Web. It’s fun, sometimes, when they’re more curious than frustrated.

“Are you going to get a job?”

“I have to.” After a moment, Ryan adds, “Condition of parole.”

“Oh.”

“It’s fine, I’ll find something. It doesn’t have to pay well. Thank you again.”

“Don’t thank me. You–“ Joe drops his eyes to the floor for a moment and squeezes the chair in a death grip, his knuckles bleaching white, before he looks up again and continues: “It was the right thing to do, what you deserved.”

Ryan isn’t sure that’s the truth. What he did was brash and more than a little misguided, more than a little idiotic and, most importantly, uncaring of the consequences to the people around him if the unthinkable happened—which it  _ did _ —and he got caught. But he doesn’t want to get into all of that now because it’s…a lot, and it’s been over a decade, and at this point most of the consequences seem like they’ve washed over Joe, and Ryan’s the one left still paying the piper. Well, except for–

“I’m sorry about Gordon.”

“Yeah,” Joe sighs, “thanks. It was hard, really hard.” He sighs again. “But I guess it helped all of us put things in perspective. It helped  _ me _ put some things in perspective, and eventually figure out another path.”

“English teacher.”

“I  _ do _ actually enjoy it,” Joe says, defensive. He lets go of the armchair and swings his arms a little.

It’s odd to witness someone being even a little bit vulnerable. Even when it’s Joe, larger-than-life Joe, making himself look bigger by standing up and swinging his arms. It calls to the forefront of Ryan’s mind the fact that this must be as awkward for Joe as it is for Ryan, and at least Ryan got to stew in his nervousness for a week before taking the plunge; Joe didn’t get any warning.

“Chinese still good? Where do you keep your takeout menus?”

Joe looks shocked for a split second, but then smiles and nods, clearly thankful for the reprieve. He doesn’t actually drag any menus out, just calls in an order.

“Beer?” Joe goes to the fridge.

“Yeah, sure.” It’ll be the first alcohol Ryan’s had in twelve years, which makes him oddly nervous, and he’s careful to only take small sips from the bottle until the food arrives.

Joe’s house doesn’t have a patio, but it does have a back porch with a picnic table and not much of a view: grass, a copse of trees, the highway off in the distance. It’s still really fucking nice, just digging into a carton of lo mein with cicadas buzzing in the background and a light breeze to ruffle through Ryan’s hair. Joe doesn’t seem to mind eating in near silence, their exchanges limited to “pass the plum sauce” and the like. Ryan’s grateful for it, especially once the food is gone and Joe brings out another beer for each of them.

Ryan startles and almost knocks over his beer when something brushes his leg. He looks down, and there’s a small black cat with white socks looking up at him disapprovingly.

Joe chuckles and reaches down to pick up the cat with one hand. “This is Lili, short for Lilliputian. She adopted me about a year ago.” After some head scritches, Lili curls up in the crook of Joe’s elbow and immediately starts purring, eyes dropping to half-mast, then to closed altogether. It’s sweet and domestic and falls into the category of things-Ryan-didn’t-even-think-to-imagine, which is the hard category, because it’s the unexpected little things that catch him off guard and send him reeling, but it’s just a cat. It’s not a reason to be blinking back tears and taking a large swallow of beer to cover it.

Ryan’s watch beeps at 8:15. “Curfew,” Ryan explains, before Joe has a chance to ask.

“Do you need a ride?”

“No, I’d rather walk.” Walk and then take the bus, Ryan doesn’t explain.

Joe deposits the cat inside on a cat bed that Ryan failed to notice before and walks Ryan to the front door, but he stops before opening it. “I’m glad you came to see me today. You’re welcome here any time.”

“Thanks, I might take you up on that.” Ryan gaze drifts away—to the door, down to his feet—as he answers, but he still sees Joe’s hand a fraction of a second before it lands on his shoulder.

“Please do.”

Joe pulls Ryan into a hug, wrapping him up in both his long arms and pulling him close, chest-to-chest. Ryan panics, which makes him stiff, and that makes him panic twice over because he doesn’t want Joe to stop, so despite a feeling of not remembering the logistics of hugging someone else—where do his arms go?—he lets instinct take over and ends up wrapping both his arms around Joe’s waist and twisting his head to hide his face as much as possible in Joe’s neck. Joe readjusts slowly, and though he doesn’t actually make the sound, Ryan feels like he’s being shushed, soothed like he’s a skittish animal. Joe wraps a hand around the back of Ryan’s head to anchor him and maybe to say, “I’m not stopping.” He rubs circles on Ryan’s back, and eventually Ryan notices that their breathing has fallen into step.

But it has to end at some point, and Ryan  _ does _ have to get back to the house. Joe lets him go easily, though his hand lingers at the back of Ryan’s neck.

“Thanks again,” Ryan says, half out the door.

“Don’t be a stranger.”

“I won’t,” Ryans looks Joe in the eye, “I promise.”

“Good,” Joe nods. “Good night.”

* * *

Joe is asleep on the couch. There’s a stack of end-of-semester papers on the coffee table, the top one littered with red. Hopefully the single stack means he got through them all. He works hard, which Ryan found surprising at first. Joe had worked hard at MacMillan Utility, obviously, but Ryan always thought it was a work ethic rising to match Joe’s ambitions. But it appears the work ethic is entirely innate.

Ryan clears Joe’s mostly empty wine glass along with the empty dinner plate and silverware and then unfolds the blanket draped across the top of the couch. Joe doesn’t even twitch as Ryan blankets his bare feet and legs, but Ryan still isn’t certain. “Joe?” he says softly, but there’s no response, none at all. It gives him the courage to reach down and comb his fingers through the hair at Joe’s forehead. It’s getting long again and a little shaggy, but it’s soft and sifts through Ryan’s fingers easily.

Joe blinks his eyes open, and Ryan has the thought to jerk his hand back, like Joe’s forehead is a hot stove that he touched by accident, but the connection between his brain and his hand is faulty, and he just freezes instead.

“What time’s it?” Joe slurs.

“Late,” Ryan says and glances down at his watch to double-check. “Almost ten.”

“Sorry.” Joe starts to sit up, but Ryan uses his hand to push down on Joe’s forehead.

“No, go back to sleep. It’s fine.” Ryan pulls his hand away.

Joe settles back into the couch, tips onto his shoulder partway and rearranges his head on the throw pillow underneath it. “Stay.”

“What?”

“Stay,” Joe repeats. He closes his eyes. “Take my bed, stay the night. I’ll make pancakes in the morning.”

Ryan watches Joe fall asleep again, and then he doesn’t really have a choice, it would seem. Joe’s bed is huge, and it smells overwhelmingly like Joe. Ryan picks the side that doesn’t have a book on the bedside table, pulls Joe’s sheets all around him and falls asleep within minutes even though he wants to stay awake to savor the moment.

The morning is bright, and upon waking up Ryan isn’t confused about where he is like he thought he might be. He remembers it all, and a bundle of nerves starts to form in his belly because soon he’s going to have to face Joe again and find out what this means. If it’s nothing, he’ll be devastated. He rolls over and buries his face in the pillow, muffling an abortive scream. He inhales, but he doesn’t smell Joe anymore. His nose has adapted; it’s become too familiar.

Ryan can hear Joe in the kitchen, grinding coffee by the sound of it. He’s gonna have to get this over with at some point, and it’d be rude to keep Joe waiting, so he brushes his teeth (there was a spare in new packaging on a shelf above the toilet, and he didn’t think Joe would mind) and splashes some water on his face, then puts yesterday’s shirt back on, and his pants.

The coffee maker is going, and Joe is pulling ingredients out for pancakes, as promised, but he turns when Ryan comes down the stairs.

“Good morning,” he says brightly. Joe has always been more of a morning person than Ryan.

“Morning.”

“Coffee’s on, help yourself when it makes the godawful screech to tell you it’s done.” Joe has milk and sugar set out by the coffee maker. “I’m going to go change into some clean clothes.”

Ryan takes his coffee—just black now, milk and sugar forgotten vices—out onto the porch because if he stays in the kitchen he feels like he should get a start on the pancakes, to help, but he doesn’t actually know how to get a start on the pancakes. It’s chilly outside, but not unbearable. Joe’s cat sniffs at his ankles but then skitters away when Ryan reaches down to give her a scritch. The coffee is strong and bracing, and it’s really nice, sitting outside in the morning chill with a whole day stretched out ahead, possibly a whole day with Joe. Maybe there’s no sense in trying to push beyond this, a comfortable friendship, companionship, not if pushing for more could carry the risk of losing  _ this _ .

“I thought you took it with milk and sugar.”

Ryan has to squint, looking up, but then Joe sits down on the same side of the picnic table, but straddling the bench, facing Ryan. He’s close, but not too close.

Ryan shrugs. “Sugar rots your teeth, and the dentists weren’t great.”

Joe doesn’t try to follow that, as he usually doesn’t when the subject of Ryan’s prison time comes up. It’s not exactly a subject they dance around: Ryan mentions it whenever it’s relevant, like now, but mentions don’t tend to spark entire conversations. Which is fine, really. There’s honestly not much to say.

Lili comes back, rubs herself against Ryan’s legs and then Joe’s, and Joe picks her up and settles her in the crook of his arm, like he usually does. He takes another sip of his coffee.

“Penny for your thoughts?”

“I don’t think she likes me,” Ryan offers, nodding at the cat.

“She’s more than half feral,” Joe muses, “I don’t think she likes anyone who doesn’t give her food on a regular basis, and I’m the only one who does that.”

“Here, hold out your arms.”

Joe shifts the cat into Ryan’s arms and then keeps a hand on her head and nape to settle her when she shifts as if to jump down. He pets her, and she calms. Eventually, she tucks her head into Ryan’s elbow and starts purring.

“There,” Joe says, but he doesn’t move away. When Ryan looks up, he realizes how much closer Joe is, close enough–

“You were really thinking about my cat?”

“No,” Ryan admits, “but a penny’s not much of a trade.”

“Hmm.” Joe leans forward even further and puts his free hand on the bench to lean on, just shy of Ryan’s thigh. “What if I tell you what I’ve been thinking?”

“Sure.”

“Ryan,” Joe prompts, until Ryan looks up and meets his gaze, “It’s an expensive thought. Treat it carefully, with respect, before you dismiss it, if that’s what you want.”

“Okay.” The nerves in Ryan’s belly are jangling.

“I was thinking that the morning light makes your eyes look really warm.” Joe strokes Lili with his thumb while he speaks, a deliberate, meditative movement. “And I like that you don’t shave very often these days, but it makes it almost impossible not to kiss you.” Ryan freezes, but doesn’t look away. Joe’s hand finally stills; it moves to Ryan’s shoulder. “Can I kiss you?”

Ryan nods weakly, and Joe’s hand drifts further up to cradle his jaw. “Yes,” he answers, in case the nod wasn’t enough, “please.”

Ryan’s arms are still full of cat, so it’s all up to Joe, but that’s better anyway. Ryan likes it, that Joe is in complete control. He likes how Joe uses both his hands to angle Ryan’s head perfectly. When he moves in, there’s no bumping of noses, only lips perfectly aligned. Joe’s first kiss is firm and intentional, meant for erasing Ryan’s doubts, perhaps. He gentles after Ryan exhales shakily through his nose, and then when Ryan starts to press back, Joe repositions Ryan’s head again and attacks at an angle designed to coax Ryan’s mouth open. Joe’s kisses turn slick and deep and insistent, and it’s completely predictable that Ryan ends up squeezing Lili too tightly. She snarls and scratches and leaps out of his arms when she’s free, and Ryan doesn’t stop, at first, but instead reaches for whatever parts of Joe he can reach by grasping blindly, now that his hands are free.

But Joe pulls back and grabs Ryan’s arms by the wrist. “Did she scratch you?”

“I’m fine, Joe.” He lets Joe inspect his forearms; there are a couple of scratches, it’s true, but they’re not deep enough to bleed. He shakes free of Joe’s grip and puts both hands on Joe’s chest. “Kiss me again.”

Joe does, but only very sweetly and gently, and briefly. “Come on, I promised pancakes.”

Joe’s muscles tense as he prepares to rise, but Ryan is bubbling over, and he’s not just going to let Joe get away now. He shifts his hands up to the base of Joe’s neck and gives a little warning squeeze: “Joseph MacMillan. I am forty years old, and still the entirety of my sexual experiences have only been with you.”

Ryan’s certainly shocked him: Joe relaxes back onto the picnic bench, dumbstruck. “I don’t want pancakes right now. I want you to take me to bed.”

The only hiccough is when Joe drops to his knees once they’re in the bedroom. Ryan forgot to make the bed, he notices with embarrassment, and it’s in that moment of distraction that Joe seizes the opportunity to drop down, and by the time Ryan catches up, his fly is unzipped, and Joe is working his pants down over his hips.

“Stop.”

Joe freezes, then shuffles backwards, sitting back on his heels. Ryan shimmies out of his pants the rest of the way but pulls his boxers back up. “Too much like that night,” he explains, “I just want–“ It’s hard to explain, but Ryan stretches his hand out. “Come on. Pants off and get in the bed. Together.”

They don’t feel very coherent, Ryan’s directions, but Joe seems to understand, and it feels like only a few moments pass before Ryan is sprawled over Joe in Joe’s bed, Joe’s hands spanning his lower back under his T-shirt, and Joe’s mouth open under his. Eventually T-shirts and both pairs of boxers come off, and it’s all skin on skin, hot and intimate. Ryan ruts into the place where Joe’s abs curve into his groin, and Joe’s cock keeps bumping roughly against Ryan’s thigh. Too soon Ryan is on the edge, his orgasm gathering tightly in his balls, so he freezes and feels Joe freeze instantly beneath him.

“Close, but–“

Joe nods in understanding. “I have an idea, if you’ll–“

Ryans nods, and Joe tips him off and over onto his side. He lays himself all along Ryan’s back, warm and solid, then reaches down and nudges at Ryan’s thighs until Ryan catches on and lifts his top leg enough for Joe to slide his cock into the gap. Joe’s cock bumps into the backs of Ryan’s balls, and that’s startling, but not bad, and then Joe catches Ryan’s hand in his and moves them both to Ryan’s cock, and that’s really good. It’s all really good: the slick slide between his legs and the combined grip and pumping action around his cock. All that’s missing is what he aims for by twisting his shoulders and blindly grasping until he finds the back of Joe’s head and pulls until he can fit their mouths together. Ryan gets the warning that Joe’s about to come when his mouth goes slack, so Ryan tightens their combined grip on his cock, and then they’re coming together, Joe pressed tight to his back and making a mess in between Ryan’s legs and all over his balls.

Joe uses his T-shirt for cursory cleanup and then pulls Ryan back into his chest again. He laces his fingers through Ryan’s and places both their hands over Ryan’s heart. Minutes pass while their heartbeats slow together.

Ryan gets a job teaching computer skills to other ex-cons and moves in with Joe. He continues to prefer sex over pancakes, but Joe thankfully doesn't take that as a insult to his cooking. Lili never really warms up to him, but even her tolerance eventually feels like a compliment.

**Author's Note:**

> This was drawer fic written after I binged HaCF last year and Joe/Ryan took over my brain for a short while. Reread it recently when I was in a Mood, and hey it lifted my spirits a bit so maybe it'll do so for some of the rest of you out there in the wide world.
> 
> Details about Ryan's prison sentence (apparently he got the maximum of 10 years, in this AU) are pretty under-researched, which I feel poorly about, but some details I lifted from the AMAZING podcast Ear Hustle, produced out of the San Quentin prison in CA. I very much encourage everyone to give it a listen, especially in these times when so many people have newly become hungry for resources to learn about institutional racism. The American prison system and mass incarceration of Black people is very much a part of that and very much deserves a critical lens alongside police brutality.
> 
> Title from [PEP 20](https://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-0020/), because that as a source felt appropriate.


End file.
